Wireless networks are telecommunication networks that use radio waves to carry information from one node in the network to one or more receiving nodes in the network. Cellular telephony is characterized by the use of radio cells that provide radio coverage for a geographic area, with multiple cells arranged to provide contiguous radio coverage over a larger area. Wired communication can also be used in portions of a wireless network, such as between cells or access points.
Wireless communication technologies are used in connection with many user equipment, including, for example, satellite communications systems, portable digital assistants (PDAs), laptop computers, and mobile devices (e.g., cellular telephones). One benefit that users of such devices can obtain is the ability to connect to a network (e.g., the Internet) as long as the user is within range of such a wireless communication technology. Current wireless communication systems use either, or a combination of, circuit switching and packet switching in order to provide mobile data services to mobile devices. Generally speaking, with circuit-based approaches, wireless data is carried by a dedicated (and uninterrupted) connection between the sender and recipient of data using a physical switching path. Packet-based approaches, on the other hand, typically do not permanently assign transmission resources to a given session, and do not require the set-up and tear-down of physical connections between a sender and receiver of data. In general, a data flow in packet-based approaches is divided into separate segments of information or packets. The data flow may include a number of packets or a single packet.
Data flows can be assigned different Quality of Service (QoS) levels. In the networking context, QoS refers to the overall performance of a telephony or computer network, particularly the performance seen by the users of the network. To quantitatively measure quality of service, several related aspects of the network service can be considered, such as error rates, bandwidth, throughput, transmission delay, availability, jitter, etc. Appropriately assigning QoS is useful for the transport of network traffic with special requirements. For example, time-sensitive network traffic related to video conferencing, audio streaming or video streaming applications may require different QoS from that for network traffic related to less time-sensitive applications such as emails or texting.
Existing 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) approaches to providing QoS differentiation are based on the concept of routing different IP packets into different bearers. A 3GPP Long Term Evolution (LTE) network is a connection-oriented transmission network and, as such, requires the establishment of a “virtual” connection between two endpoints, such as between a User Equipment (UE) and a Packet Data Network Gateway (PDN-GW). This virtual connection is called an “EPS Bearer.” “EPS” stands for “Evolved Packet System.” An EPS bearer can be characterized by:                An Allocation Retention Priority (ARP)—this parameter refers to the priority used for the allocation and retention mechanisms. ARP is typically used for the allocation of the bearer resources at session startup or during handover mechanisms and can also be used for deciding which bearers need to be preserved in case of a congestion situation. Once the bearer is established, the ARP typically has no impact on scheduling or packet-handling mechanisms.        Guaranteed Bit Rate (GBR)—this parameter is only applicable to bearers which require guaranteed QoS for services such as voice or streaming.        Maximum Bit Rate (MBR)—this parameter is used to set a limit on the data rate expected for the related service. In case the observed bit rate exceeds this limit, the EPS network can limit the effective rate by applying traffic-shaping functions.        QoS Class Identifier (QCI)—this parameter is used as a reference to a set of Access Network-related QoS parameters. This parameter can be a scalar number, and each QCI level can be associated with a different Packet Delay Budget value and Packet Loss Rate value, as well as other QoS related parameters. Presently, the LTE standard defines nine separate QCI levels. Higher QCI can be used for high demand applications such as real time gaming or video streaming, while lower QCI can be used for lower-demand applications such as best effort TCP bulk data.        